5G-NR Advances 5G Deployment Timetable

5G New Radio (5G-NR) is expected to become the global 5G standard for radios, and also allows at least some tier-one providers to launch 5G services up to a year earlier than originally forecast, in frequency bands below 6 GHz. 

Industry Transformation Boot Camp: Where Telecom Is Going, and Why

For the first time, PTC has joined two separate educational events to create the "Industry Transformation Boot Camp,” designed to acquaint mid-career telecom professionals with the skills they will need to advance their careers, as well as equip them with 5G/mobile and telecom business fundamentals.

To be held in Bangkok, from 18 September through 22 September, the Boot Camp includes certificates of completion for two days of 5G training and three days of instruction on the fundamentals of the telecom business.

Taught by teams of international instructors with dozens to scores of years of experience each, training week offers an intensive but compact framework for understanding:

• Industry economics and key trends
• Evolution of the mobile and fixed industry segments
• Problem-solving exercises to acquaint you with C-level challenges
• How C-level executives approach their key business problems
• What 5G is and what it means for the future of the telecom business

Specifically designed to acquaint up-and-coming professionals with the perspective they will need as they move up the ranks, taught by executives who have founded and run companies, and themselves “moved up the ranks” of some of the biggest firms, globally.

What you will learn:

• The key C-level issues in telecom
• How executives identify and approach their key business problems
• How executives deal with competition
• How top execs manage internal challenges
• How the C-suite harvests legacy revenues, grows new revenue
• How product innovation happens
• How to navigate tough markets
• What is the future of networks?
• What is the future for mobile services?
• How regulators see 5G arriving
• How spectrum policies will change
• How 4G becomes 5G
• How mobile execs can “move up the stack”

...and much more.

Learn more about PTC Academy and Spectrum Futures, the two components of training week, a week of learning to equip Asia telecom professionals with what they must know to lead their businesses.

Instructors include:

REZA AREFI

Director of Spectrum Strategy

Intel Corporation

USA

DEAN BUBLEY

Founder

Disruptive Analysis

United Kingdom

ANUP CHANGAROTH

Senior Director, Business Development & Solutions (Asia Pacific)

Ciena

Singapore

WEN-CHUNG GUO

Commissioner

National Communications Commission

Taiwan

SACHIN GUPTA

Founder

New Street Capital Asia

Singapore

TAUFUIK HASAN

Commissioner

Indonesian Telecommunication Regulatory Authority

Indonesia

BOB HORTON

Director and Principal

Horton Consulting

Australia

RUMI IIZUKA

Principal Researcher

Spectrum Utilization Research Division

Foundation for MultiMedia Communications (FMMC)

Japan

SANJAY KAMAT

Managing Partner

Bell Labs Consulting

USA

ANTOINE KASSIS

Managing Partner

Kurrant

Thailand

HEIKKI KOKKINEN

CEO

Fairspectrum

Finland

WING K. LEE

CEO

YTL Communications

Malaysia

RUSSELL LUNDBERG

CTO

Bangkok Beach Telecom

Thailand

TUAN ANH NGUYEN

Deputy Head, Radio Frequency Policy & Planning Division

Authority of Radio Frequency Management

Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC)

Vietnam

MARC OLIVIER

VP Networks & Operators, Asia & Pacific

Sigfox

Singapore

ALEX ORANGE

Director, Government Affairs, Taiwan, Southeast Asia & Pacific

Qualcomm Incorporated

Hong Kong SAR China

ALLAN RASMUSSEN

Managing Director

Yozzo Co., Ltd

Thailand

DENNY SETIAWAN

Acting Deputy Director General for Spectrum Policy and Planning

Directorate General of Resources and Standard

Ministry of Communications and IT

Indonesia

JAMES SULLIVAN

Managing Director & Head, Asia ex Japan Research

J.P. Morgan Securities Singapore Pte Ltd

Singapore

HERU SUTADI

Executive Director & Chief of Communication

Indonesia ICT Institute

Indonesia

JENNIFER WARREN

VP, Technology Policy & Regulation

Lockheed Martin Corporation

USA

DAVE WRIGHT

Director, Regulatory Affairs & Network Standards

Ruckus Wireless

USA

Mike Alexander

Distinguished Engineer, IBM

USA

Sean Bergin

President & Co-Founder, APTelecom

Cambodia

Eric Handa

CEO, APTelecom

USA

Gary Kim

Founder, Spectrum Futures

USA

Keith Shaw

Vice President, Business Development EMEA, Equinix

Netherlands

Chris Wilson

CEO, ASEAN, TIME dotCom Berhad

Malaysia

Herbert Xiong

Director, Asia Pacific Sales, TE Subcom

People’s Republic of China

You also will learn from some of the most-noted industry analysts and commentators in the mobile and fixed industries.

Apple Introduced 3 New Products June 29, 2007

“An iPod, a phone, an internet communicator….an iPod, a phone, an internet communicator..are you getting it?” Steve Jobs said on June 29, 2007, on the day Apple introduced the iPhone, a decade ago, today.

Will "Best Technology" Win IoT Race?

Internet of things connectivity might take any number of forms, using a variety of protocols and networks using a mix of unlicensed and licensed spectrum. It is easy to think the eventual winners will have the "best" technology. That might not happen.

Quite often, when important new technologies are developing, the "best" technology does not win the commercial race. There are lots of reasons, but value in such situations includes many considerations other than a narrow evaluation of technology.

Ecosystem economics, fit with existing business processes and business models, supplier stability, "go to market" advantages, capital reserves and lots of other practical deployment issues will tend to tip the scale, when the time comes for volume deployment.

Generally speaking, networking platforms and protocols tend to win out, in the market, because they get scale. When there are multiple competing platforms, it often is not the “first” or “earliest” contenders, but the later alternatives with scale that take most of the share.

Those of you with long memories might recall that was the case for computer operating systems, was the case for competing 4G platforms and arguably 3G before that. In the smartphone area, the eventual winners were not “first” on the scene.

So it comes as no surprise that analysts at Maravedis believe the mobile networks using licensed spectrum eventually will represent most of the internet of things connections, globally.

In the area of specialized networks using unlicensed spectrum, Maravedis believes Wi-SUN platforms for utility networks be quite important, as well. In the early going, platforms often compete based on the perceived value of specifications. Long term, commercial scale typically decides the issue.

Source: Maravedis

Source: Maravedis

China Will be Biggest 5G Market

Chinese operators are on track to launch commercial 5G networks by 2020 and are expected to establish China as the world’s largest 5G market by 2025, according to a new study by GSMA Intelligence and the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT).

Mobile operators in China plan to run a phased testing period for 5G networks from 2017 to 2019 before launching commercially in 2020. Following commercial deployment, it is forecast that 5G connections in China will reach 428 million by 2025, accounting for 39 per cent of the 1.1 billion global 5G connections expected by that point, GSMA Intelligence predicts.

The study also shows that industry insiders see a mismatch between “most important” new revenue sources. All prior mobile networks generated most of their revenue from selling services to consumers and human users.

The coming 5G era is likely to be the first mobile network generation whose new revenue sources are likely to come from enterprise customers, not consumers.

Among the potential 5G business model challenges is a mismatch between the expected value of use cases and hoped-for revenue opportunities. Put simply, the gigabit speeds 5G will enable for “enhanced mobile broadband” are not generally needed, so value will be low. But operators making investments will be looking for a financial return, so there will be pressure to price faster 5G services at higher levels than 4G. But 4G still will work for most consumer applications.

How important will 4K or 8K video, virtual reality and augmented reality really prove to be, early on? And how much more will consumers pay to get such support?

At the same time, the greatest hope for incremental revenue growth might come from enterprise apps generated by various internet of things applications, even if those take longer to develop.

At least, those are reasonable inferences from what industry executives currently believe. A survey by GSMA Intelligence found 69 percent of respondents believed enterprise apps (for IoT) would be the most-important drivers of new revenues. Just 23 percent believed consumer apps would be the most-important new revenue source produced by 5G.

In fact, three of four very-important new drivers of revenue are in the enterprise space, not the consumer space. In other words, it is easily possible to argue that 5G is the first mobile network generation of greatest value for enterprise applications, not direct consumer use cases.

source: GSMA Intelligence

T-Mobile US Wants CBRS Optimized for 5G

T-Mobile US has asked the Federal Communications Commission to change the licensing rules for Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS), the 150-MHz band in the 3.5-GHz region to use a novel spectrum sharing method for access.

T-Mobile US argues that making CBRS seconary licenses more compatible with 5G will increase its value. Specifically, T-Mobile US wants the FCC to auction all 150 megahertz of spectrum in the 3.5 GHz band as “priority access licenses.”  At the moment, the FCC only plans to allow PAL in portions of the total available spectrum, up to a maximum of 70 MHz in any single market.

T-Mobile US recommends authorizing PALs on a standard, ten-year license term with renewal expectancy, not the shorter terms presently envisioned.

The firm also argues that the FCC should make all PALs available at auction, regardless of the number of applications received, and permit bidding on specific PAL blocks.  

At least in part, T-Mobile takes that position because the 3.5 GHz band will be used in Europe and elsewhere for 5G operations, and greater similarity of CBRS rules, including suitability for 5G, should allow T-Mobile greater efficiencies in terms of handsets and infrastructure.

The Radio Spectrum Policy Group (“RSPG”), a high-level advisory group that assists the European Commission in the development of radio spectrum policy, released an analysis of 5G alternatives and concluded in part that it considers the 3400-3800 MHz band “to be the primary band suitable for the introduction of 5G-based services in Europe even before 2020, noting that this band is already harmonised for mobile networks, and consists of up to 400 MHz of contiguous spectrum enabling wide channel bandwidth.”

The United Kingdom has begun a rulemaking proceeding that proposes making 3.6 to 3.8 GHz available for future mobile services including 5G. Ireland is auctioning capacity in the 3475-3800 MHz band.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority issued a discussion paper seeking comment on whether and how to proceed with making the 3575-3700 MHz band available for mobile broadband services.

Japan has already allocated and licensed (to three carriers) spectrum in the 3.5 GHz band for mobile broadband and its Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications identified the 3.4 GHz band as a candidate into which to extend 5G services. And China recently issued a public consultation request seeking comment on plans to use the 3300-3600 MHz and 4800-5000 MHz bands for 5G.

The proposed changes would help harmonize use of the 3.5-GHz spectrum for 5G, on a wider global scale.